Generally, a refrigerator is an appliance for storing food in a fresh state within a storage compartment (freezing compartment or refrigerating compartment) for a certain period of time by cooling the storage compartment through repeated operation of a refrigeration cycle.
Such a refrigerator includes a compressor for compressing refrigerant circulating through a refrigeration cycle into a high-temperature and high-pressure state. The refrigerant compressed in the compressor generates cold air while passing through a heat exchanger, and the generated cold air is supplied to a freezing compartment or a refrigerating compartment.
Generally, the refrigerator has an arrangement in which the freezing compartment is arranged at the upper side, and the refrigerating compartment is arranged at the lower side. On the other hand, in a side-by-side type refrigerator, the freezing and refrigerating compartments thereof are arranged to laterally neighbor to each other.
In a refrigerator of another type, a storage compartment provided at the upper or lower side of the refrigerator can be opened by two side-by-side type doors.
In the case in which one storage compartment can be opened by two side-by-side type doors, a pillar is provided at one of the two doors. The pillar, which is provided at only one of the two doors, comes into contact with the two doors through rotation thereof when the storage compartment is closed by the two doors and, as such, functions to enhance sealability of the storage compartment.
In a conventional refrigerator provided with such a pillar, typically, a structure including a protrusion and a guide groove is provided at an inner case of the refrigerator in order to guide rotation of the pillar.
In conventional cases, the structure to guide rotation of the pillar is formed at an upper portion of the inner case, to extend downwards. For this reason, there is inconvenience in using the storage compartment by the user.
Furthermore, in a state in which the door provided with the pillar seals a corresponding portion of the storage compartment, the pillar obstructs a path, along which a drawer installed in the refrigerator moves, because the pillar is in a state of being unfolded while escaping from the corresponding door. For this reason, there is a problem in that, when two drawers are arranged in parallel, the drawers should have different widths.
Furthermore, since the pillar is in an unfolded state as mentioned above, baskets provided at the doors should have smoothly curved corners in order to prevent the baskets from coming into contact with the pillar during rotation thereof together with the doors. For this reason, there is a problem in that the storage capacity of each basket is reduced.